Shepherd’s Pie with Sweet Potato Topping

Hearty, comfort food at its finest. Shepherd’s Pie with Sweet Potato Topping is a family-pleasing, meal prep friendly and an incredibly tasty recipe.

Shepherd’s Pie with Sweet Potato Topping is a recipe you’ll likely make again and again!

We shared this recipe a few years back at the beginning of our blogging days. It was a recipe I had created for a cooking class. Those that have been following us for a while may remember this recipe or may have even tried it. Heck, it may even be included in your menu rotation. Well, we’ve updated the photos and are republishing it because it’s just too good not share a second time! This Shepherd’s Pie is one of the most popular recipes on our blog. I mean, you really can’t beat a dish made of hearty, wholesome, comfort foods, right?

Shepherd’s Pie is made with just a few ingredients, and like many of our recipes the ingredients can be tweaked with what you have on hand or what sounds good to you. For example, if you don’t care for mushrooms go ahead and omit them and add zucchini instead (or another veggie of your choosing). No grass-fed ground beef or ground lamb on hand? Use organic ground turkey instead or maybe you want to make it vegan-friendly. If so, you could try using lentils. You do YOU!

Shepherd’s Pie is freezer-friendly, too.

I’m all about freezer-friendly recipes. Cooking once, eating twice (or more) is my jam! This dish freezes nicely, so you can go ahead and double the recipe making two 9×9 dishes and freezing one of them for a future meal. No need to do the final baking (see recipe below) with the one you freeze as you’ll bake it the day you serve it. You can even take it a step further by portioning out servings into individual containers (I like these containers). Having a freezer full of already prepared meals makes for easy weeknight dinners.

Substitute regular potatoes for the sweet potatoes if you wish.

I’m a sweet potato lover, but if you’d prefer a regular mashed potato topping or it’s what you have on hand, there’s no need to make a special trip to the grocery store. Feel free to make that simple substitution.

Serve it with a fresh mixed green salad or steamed green beans for a veg-heavy meal.

I rounded this meal out with a serving of extra veg. Simply steam up some green beans or whip up a mixed green salad. If you’re looking for a homemade dressing, we’ve got you covered – try our Paleo Ranch or Citrus Vinaigrette with Thyme.

Shepherd’s Pie with Sweet Potato Topping

A hearty and satisfying meal for the entire family to enjoy. This dish freezes well, so you can go ahead and double the recipe and freeze half for a future meal. Having a freezer full of already prepared meals makes for easy weeknight dinners. Feel free to substitute regular potatoes for the sweet potatoes if you wish.

Instructions

Cook on medium heat until carrots are soft, about 12-15 minutes. Begin making the topping while the meat filling cooks.

Once the carrots are soft, stir in tomato paste, water, seasonings, salt and pepper.

For the topping: Steam or bake (at 375℉) the sweet potatoes until fork tender. Then add all of the topping ingredients to a food processor (or blender) and process until smooth. NOTE: If using white potatoes, we recommend mashing them by hand rather than blending to prevent them from getting pasty.

Final step: Transfer the meat filling to a casserole dish (9 x 9 inch dish will work) or 10 inch cast iron skillet and top the meat filling with the sweet potato mash. Dash with sea salt and chili powder.

Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and serve.

Notes

To reheat if frozen: Remove from freezer and place in fridge the day before you plan to serve it. Simply reheat in the oven set at 375℉ for about 20-30 minutes or until center is hot (~165℉). You can reheat from frozen, it will however take a little longer. If reheating from frozen, cover with foil for the first 30 minutes. Remove foil and continue to bake until center is hot (~165℉).

This post contains affiliate links, which means we receive a percentage of the sale if you use the link to make your purchase. This does not change the price of the product. This income directly offsets the cost of web hosting and maintenance so we greatly appreciate your support.

All photos and content are copyright protected. Please do not use our photos without prior written permission. If you wish to republish this recipe, please rewrite the recipe in your own unique words and link back to the source recipe here on The Real Food Dietitians. Thank you!

About Stacie Hassing

Stacie is a Licensed and Registered Dietitian from rural southern Minnesota where she and her husband reside on 5 acres with their two pups, Walter & Lucy. She’s a creator of simple and wholesome recipes, a lover of nature, a crossfitter, a seasonal runner, and she’s on a mission to inspire as many as she can live a healthier and happier life from the inside out.

Love the sound of this recipe! For the freezer friendly version, would you advise preparing it with all of the steps and then placing in the freezer before the final baking process? Then when ready to have thaw in the fridge overnight and place in the over for 15 minutes of baking and then it will be done?

Yes, for a freezer-friendly version you’ll want to prepare the recipe all the way through then wrap in foil and freeze (rather than bake). Allowing it to thaw overnight will reduce your final cooking time though it will still take more than 15 minutes to heat through and brown up the topping. You may be looking at 30-35 minutes for that final bake time. Great question!

I recently began eating only whole foods and cutting anything processed out of my diet. My husband has not been enjoying this sudden change. That being said, he actually liked this recipe and I loved all of the nutritional benefits! Thank you for the wonderful recipe!

Good for you for cleaning up your diet and making the move to more unprocessed foods. It can be hard on husbands to make the move with you, especially if it’s sudden, but it’s worth the effort. My best tip is to go slowly (they’re kind of like kids in this way), stop bringing processed foods into the home even if they’re his favorite and don’t judge when you see him eating those foods – instead, offer plenty of better options — our recipes are a great place to start — with a sprinkling of his old favorites in the mix from time to time until. It’s all about balance for all of us – deprivation leads to over doing it – so better to take a more moderate approach when it comes to getting a spouse on board with clean eating (for your sanity and theirs!)

It was removed. We did some further recipe testing and found that it wasn’t necessary to hold the filling together. However, if you want to add it, the original recipe called for 1 Tbsp. flax meal + 3 Tbsp. water mixed together to form a gel.

I am making this recipe tonight! I also just got an instant pot last week and didn’t think of steaming the potatoes in it until I read this. What are the settings for that? I’d love to try it tonight but if not, I know it will be helpful for future reference! 🙂

I place the potatoes in a steamer basket inside my Instant Pot (or on the included rack if they’re larger and won’t fall through) then add 1 cup of water or broth – then I select the manual setting under high pressure for 4-7 minutes depending on their size (I also add 15% to the cooking time for high-altitude which may or may not be your case) – then use natural pressure release, about 15 minutes, before opening the vent valve and removing the lid.

So sometimes on pinterest you find dinner recipes that sound so good and then you make them and they are okay. This is one of those that sound good, look good and most importantly tastes good. I went whole 30 and therefore my family went whole30 for dinner but everyone loves this *mwuahaha (evil laughter). No eyeball roll from my oldest, no picking around things from my youngest. This was great thank you!! PS: I had whole30 ketchup on hand but no tomato paste and I subbed it in and it worked great!

Hahahahahaha! This is awesome. Thanks for sharing your Whole30-but-the-fam-didn’t-know-it win with us. This is a great recipe for life beyond Whole30, too. I always double the recipe when I make it so I can freeze one for another time – just thaw overnight in the fridge (or longer) and bake it a little longer and you’ve got an easy, clean meal on your hands.

Saw this on pinterest and it looked oh so good! I got a thumbs up from 2/4 and it was just ok from me. But, I did use turkey, so that’s not fair and actual sweet potatoes instead of yams. I will have to try with beef and yams and come back for a revised review! Always love trying new recipes that nourish my family. Thanks for posting!

Thanks for the feedback. Turkey is definitely less flavorful so would love to hear the results for Round 2. Keep in mind, our recipes are designed to be family-friendly so if you like a little more spice then by all means, feel free to add more.

Just made this – AMAZING! I added some goat cheese into the sweet potato and I completely forgot to add the chili powder to it, but it was still delicious! I also added shredded cheese as a top layer. This is definitely a keeper – Thank you for a great recipe! 🙂

This was delicious! I’ve always skipped over sweet potato Shephard pie recipes bc they didn’t sound too appealing for some reason . Searching for something to make with what was on hand today and this fit the bill. We loved it! I left out the flax bc I forgot I was out. I wanted it a little saucy so I added a cup or so of beef broth to the filling at the end to deglaze and then added some cornstarch dissolved in water to thicken it. Everything else I followed exactly and it came out great. Thanks!

Hi Ariel, it helps to hold everything together. Flax works as a great substitute for eggs because when mixed with water it creates a gel like substance. Feel free to omit the flax or egg white altogether. The Pie will still turn out delicious!

We loved this, thanks! I did double the beef portion (not the sweet potato topping) and I’m glad I did- it fed 4 of us with no leftovers. Granted our two boys are big eaters, but I don’t think it would have been filling enough for 4 with just 1# of ground beef. Also, I sprinkled the beef w arrowroot and after draining off some grease, I added in homemade beef stock to make it more of a gravy. Will def make again!!

Oooooohhhh!! I love your idea of using arrowroot starch and beef stock to make a gravy. I agree that with 2 boys doubling the beef is key. I have two young daughters and with my hubby and me there’s usually a small portion left (provided I also serve a big salad and a green veggie on the side).

Unfortunately I tried this recipe with regular potatoes and they became a terrible paste in the blender…. Kept everything the same and even baked the potatoes . Maybe I should have boiled them to keep more of the moisture.

The likely culprit of the pastiness was the fact that white potatoes contain more starch than sweet potatoes and even this can vary from variety to variety. Thus mashing the potatoes when using white (rather than blending) is recommended. I’ve updated the recipe to note this.

We’re removed the flaxseed for the sake of simplicity and fewer ingredients, plus further recipe testing told us that it wasn’t necessary to hold the filling together. However, like you say – for the health benefits- it’s a great add-in. The ‘Old recipe’ called for 1 Tbsp. flax meal mixed with 3 Tbsp. water to make a gel which you then stirred into the cooking filling.

This was took way longer then 25 min to prep. Peeling and cubeing the sweet potatoe alone took about 20. Then baking the sweet potato took like 30 min before they were soft. Hoping this is as good as everyone says it is

Is the filling suppose to taste more like a similar to a spaghetti sauce? I will be using russet potatoes instead of sweet potatoes. Hopefully, it will all come together and my husband will like it. Thank you for the recipe 🙂

This recipe is what got me and my husband through the Whole30! It’s the perfect meal that doesn’t make me miss noncompliant foods at all. We will be done with the Whole30 in two days but will definitely continue making this! Thank you thank you for such a great recipe!!

Hi! Will try this tonight for dinner. My husband and I completed Whole30 end of October 2016. We both lost 15 lbs. each and since then have tried to eat 75-80% W30 since. I have kept my weight off completely, feel 100% better off all whites and especially sugar. I have to even sweeten my tea here IN THE SOUTH, with just a hint of Stevia. It is a whole new lifestyle for us, but WORKS. We are in our late 50’s!!

I completed a Whole 30 in September and have been still eating a lot of the same recipes since then. Since the holidays I need a reset so I’m doing my second Whole 30 now. I’ve made this recipe and my whole family loves it, including the “non-whole thirtiers.” I highly recommend the Whole 30 for improved health and recipes such as this one since they taste wonderful and are so good for you:)

I really love the flavors in this dish! The only thing I might do differently the next time I make it is try regular potatoes OR maybe I might just put the filling over a baked sweet potato. Something about the smoothness of the sweet potato was not the right texture for my hubby. But the flavors are great together. I will be adding to my rotation thank you!

Could I use your cauliflower butternut squash mash recipe for the topping instead of the sweet potatoes? If so, should I omit the sage? Or, if I did you suggestion of a cauliflower turnip mash, how do you suggest I go about preparing it?!

You can certainly use the Cauliflower Butternut Squash Mash for the topping for this – and yes, I’d leave out the sage if doing so. As for the cauls-turnip mash option, I’d recommend steaming the turnips until almost tender then adding the cauliflower so they cauliflower does’t get overcooked. Then mash with a little of the cooking liquid and ghee (if desired) and season with salt and pepper.

This was absolutely delicious and so simple! I just finished my second Whole30 ten days ago, but my husband and I couldn’t get enough. I’m so glad that I found this recipe and wish I would have stumbled across it earlier! I might just boil my sweet potatoes next time so that they are a little easier to work with and less prep, but the roasted potatoes worked fine too! I added pecans to my leftovers because I was craving crunchy and that was a great addition! Thank you for sharing!

I did the Whole 30 for the first time in November/December 2017, and this recipe quickly became one of my favorites! One thing I changed from the original recipe…I boiled the sweet potatoes and blended them with my immersion blender & they turned out beautifully. My husband also loves this dish, so it will become a staple in our household. Thank you for a great meal that is healthy and easy to prepare!

Please accept our apologies, we are experiencing an intermittent technical hiccup that our team is looking into. Please refresh your browser and if the recipe does not appear you can email us at: info@therealfoodrds.com and we’ll be happy to assist you.

You can leave out the tomato paste though you’ll more of a loose meat texture under the potatoes (which will still be delicious and a lot like spreading mashed potatoes a slice of meatloaf). A tablespoon or two of flax meal mixed with water (1 Tbsp. flax meal to 3 Tbsp. water) will also help bind the filling together.

This was super yummy. I only had ground turkey but it was still fantastic. My 19month and 4 year old gobbled it up and wanted seconds!!!! Now we will see if the hubby and my other 2 kids will love it!!!! Great recipe, thanks for sharing!!!!!!

A little late to the game but I felt compelled to share I made this last night and absolutely loved it! I added some chicken sausage and all the veggies I had in my fridge and a cup of beef broth/corn starch and water to make it more saucy.

The only thing I will do differently next time is spice up the sweet potato mash before baking as i like it more savory and found myself adding salt/garlic/chili powder as I was eating.

If I wanted to make ahead, could you prepare all and have ready in fridge to pop in oven? Or would you suggest pureeing sweet potatoes just before baking? Could you even prep a few and freeze in pans to bake later? Would love some tips here!

If you want to prep this ahead you can make it up to the point of baking then either refrigerate or freeze. If you baking from refrigerated, just allow it to sit at room temperature while your oven preheats. You may need to add some extra baking time.

If baking from frozen, allow it to thaw overnight (or up to 2 days) in the fridge then cover with foil and bake – again, adding more baking time as needed, until it hot throughout. The amount of extra time you’ll need will depend on how frozen it still is when putting it in the oven. Hope that helps!

I have made this three times and love it. It freezes so well (I cut it in servings before freezing and just put it in the microwave w a tiny bit of water in the bottom of the dish and a cover on the dish.) )In the topping I do not put either the ghee or coconut oil- just the sweets and some cinnamon and really it is delicious.

Primary Sidebar

Welcome

The Real Food Dietitians is the passion-driven product of Registered Dietitian Nutritionists Stacie Hassing and Jessica Beacom. They’ve combined their love of nutrition, health and real food with the concepts of ease and convenience to bring you recipes that are big on flavor but short on ingredients.